Why Remoaners are so terrified of a General Election

The ridiculousness of the ‘Stop the Coup’ movement is now starkly exposed. For the past week a few thousand members of the obsessively anti-Brexit urban elites have taken to the streets to accuse Boris Johnson of behaving like a dictator by suspending parliament for a few more days than is normal. ‘It’s a coup d’état!’, they hysterically cry. And yet now our supposed dictator, the author of this foul, anti-democratic coup, is offering people a General Election, and how have the ‘Stop the Coup’ saps responded? By saying they don’t want one.

What a momentous self-own. They have literally traipsed through the streets saying ‘Britain is a dictatorship’ and ‘Boris has stolen our democracy’. Now, Boris hasn’t only disproven this claptrap (dictators don’t usually suggest holding an election). He has also helped to expose the fact that if anyone is agitated and even disgusted by the idea of democracy right now, it isn’t the imaginary jackbooted generals of Downing Street – it’s the pseudo-democratic Remainer elite.

All of them are running scared from the idea of a General Election. Labour has made clear that it will not be backing the call for an election, at least not until No Deal Brexit has been legally taken off the table. ‘We are not going to dance to Boris Johnson’s tune’, said Labour’s shadow Brexit secretary Keir Starmer this morning when asked if the party would back Boris’s General Election proposal in parliament later today. An election on Boris’s terms would be a ‘trap’ for Labour, he said.

Jo Swinson, leader of the Lib Dems, is against an election too. And her justification is very revealing indeed. In the Commons she said ‘It is vital that this House acts with responsibility and does not tip our country into an election at a point when there is any risk that we will crash out of the European Union during that election campaign or immediately after.’ With added emphasis she declared: ‘We must act responsibly.’

This implicit contrasting of the responsible nature of the Commons and the apparent recklessness and craziness of engaging the public sums up the Remainer discomfort with having a General Election. What Swinson and others are essentially saying is that the political elite, being rational and wise, must oversee the Brexit process right now. We cannot ask the pesky people for their opinions. Some of those ghastly plebs passionately support Brexit, after all, and some are even favourable towards a No Deal Brexit. To the anti-democratic Remainer elite, it is public engagement, the scourge of democracy, that got us into this mess in the first place – so the longer we can put off another vote, the better.

These politicians loathe the idea of an election for two reasons. First, they want to try to keep Brexit, and the crushing of it, as the business of the political class alone, for as long as they can. And secondly, because they fear the judgement of the people. They fear our verdict on their behaviour, on their depraved agitations against the democratic will over the past three years. They fear what we will say about that vast bulk of them who okayed the holding of the EU referendum, promised to respect the result of the referendum, and stood in the 2017 General Election on manifestos that plainly said we would leave the EU, and yet who have backtracked on all of that and now devote their energies to stopping Brexit. They fear hearing what we really think about the lies and deceit and other authoritarian activities they have engaged in over the past couple of years.

And they are right to fear it. People are angry. They are alarmed to have discovered since the vote for Brexit just how patrician and dishonest our political class is. And now these politicians who crow unconvincingly about saving democracy do not want to submit themselves to the democratic test of a General Election, at least not without some strict conditions attached. Little do they know that their fear and dread of seeking the public’s approval only confirms to us that this is one of the most dishonourable and unprincipled political elites of modern times.

Eric Blair

8th September 2019 at 7:33 am

Another ludicrous assertion from Mr O’Neill. Of course Labour, LIb Dem and (especially) the SNP want an election. But everyone knows the only reason Boris proposed it last week was to allow no deal through. All this faux outrage is ridiculous.

Jane Carter

8th September 2019 at 10:10 am

Yes he thinks the electorate might support him. If he won an election prior to Oct 31st he would have an instruction from the electorate to ‘allow’ a no deal to go through on that date.
Heaven forbid that the voters should have a say in this way!

Jerry Owen

9th September 2019 at 5:25 pm

E Blair
Are you telling me politics is partisan… whatever next !!

Marvin Jones

10th September 2019 at 11:44 am

No further proof needed, that you and your cowardly remainer mob of traitors are terrified of the power of the real people’s votes on a no deal Brexit, just to stick your tyrannical noses in the sewers where they belong.

Edward Danczak

13th September 2019 at 4:21 pm

Litigation seems to be the order of the day, well, Civitas have just written this up. It should make everyone cringe with embarassmnent that we have allowed our politicians to happily behave unlawfully by denying an election thereby keeping themselves in power, the same generation of politicians busy in the expenses scandal still havnt learnt any lessons:

The UK signed the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in 1948, a document that succinctly explains why elections matter. Article 21 (3) says:

‘The will of the people shall be the basis of the authority of government; this will shall be expressed in periodic and genuine elections which shall be by universal and equal suffrage and shall be held by secret vote or by equivalent free voting procedures.’

The UK also signed the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights in 1976. Article 25 says that ‘every citizen shall have the right and the opportunity … to take part in the conduct of public affairs, directly or through freely chosen representatives … and to vote and to be elected at genuine periodic elections which shall be by universal and equal suffrage and shall be held by secret ballot, guaranteeing the free expression of the will of the electors’.

The majority in Parliament is preventing the Article 21 ‘will of the people’ from being expressed and denying the Article 25 ‘free expression of the will of the electors’.

The UK played a central part in framing these documents and until recently parliamentarians did not need to have their noses rubbed in human-rights declarations to get them to see where their duty lies. But today, a narrow and shameless majority dominates.

SNJ Morgan

8th September 2019 at 3:48 am

What should be absolutely clear to everyone (outside of the M25 bubble) is that Corbyn has zero credibility left (if he ever had any).

Once supposedly as anti-EU as Farage himself, he’s now a ‘Remainer’ for political expediency alone.

Nobody in their right minds would vote for him – ever.

SNJ Morgan

8th September 2019 at 3:32 am

Unfortunately, I gather Dominic Cummings is very anti-Farage, so an election may not deliver what the people want anyway.

Why he is anti-Farage and the Brexit Party I don’t know, but for supposedly being the brains behind Boris Johnson’s Brexit strategy, he isn’t showing a lot of common sense here. The Tories MUST have Farage and the Brexit Party on board – it’s simply a must.

We can only hope that behind the scenes talks are underway.

gor ben

7th September 2019 at 1:05 pm

I am a little tired of reading about elitism and political classes. The British are consumed by class and it is often used as a weapon of no consequence. To have an view on the subject of brexit means being tainted by commentators with simplistic arguments and patronising opinions of belonging to an elite does elite have a value? I would argue elite is a pejorative term usually associating itself to class based insults. This brexit argument seems to have divided and made arguments on both sides more heightened by defamatory descriptions of opposing views. This is now the new divide and makes class arguments meaningless. If the arguments are less confrontational an understanding of the problems will eventually resolve themselves but I fear its going to take a generation and a lot of wasted time and discussion.

SNJ Morgan

Willie Penwright

7th September 2019 at 7:31 am

In today’s Guardian, a columnist – can’t remember which one – bemoans why “people often go against what seem, on paper, to be their best interests.”
Maybe the stupid people just don’t read the [news]paper where their best interests are tirelessly explained or, heaven forbid, reject that view.

Jane Carter

6th September 2019 at 9:12 am

Certain labour front bench members wish to delay an election until after October 31st even though legislation will have been passed to prevent no deal on that date.This law removes the risk of any jiggery pokery causing us to leave with no deal by default.

With an October 15 election, If labour won, they would be in charge of negotiations, no problem for them. But if the tories won they could change that law and enable us to leave with no deal, a real problem for them!

These self called called ‘democrats’ intend to take the opportunity away from the plebs to vote to leave with no deal at the end of October. Their stated aim is to prevent no deal come what may and that includes preventing the people having their say. I despair.

quaybored

5th September 2019 at 10:32 pm

We want an election. We will have one. And soon.
But only after your mighty hero, Boris Johnson, has been forced to own his failure to control Parliament, and complied with the soon-to-be law requiring Holy Brexit to be delayed by another three months.

Colin White

5th September 2019 at 9:08 pm

An entire article that fails to mention the single fact that after parliament is dissolved for a general election the PM can use royal perogative to get the date changed. Hence, why the opposition wants to delay an election until the legislation is passed.
An entire article, which you obviously put a lot of work into and yet, missed the most important fact. Did the author not know this fact or his he being disingenuous?

Jerry Owen

Jerry Owen

5th September 2019 at 3:36 pm

i think it’s been a real eye opener at just how many ‘laws, rules. and regulations’ have come into play publicly over the last few days to easily scupper Boris in anything he tries to do from implementing the result of a parliament given referendum to calling an election, an election the opposition have been shouting for.
It seems that the detail and depth of all of these things being brought into play so rapidly and efficiently, would suggest to me that they have been put in place behind our backs and in secret for eventualities like this whereby the government knew it would one day oppose its masters the public.
I would be interested to know when and by whom such intricate rules were written into Westminsters rule book for such an eventuality such as the one we have now.
Are there any more that we should know about ? Parliament has after all suspended a general election, this should worry everyone.
I could of course be wrong and they are just making it up as they go along !
Either way, these are extraordinary times where democracy has been suspended until the political elites work out how brow beat us into accepting no brexit at all, they are on the winning straight now.
Anyone who thinks this is about a ‘deal or no deal’ has to be politically illiterate and by default all those remainiacs have been found out for exactly what they are, liars and cheats to a man.
The ease the elites have suspended democracy and reversed everything they promised (!) us in a few short weeks is uncanny, and for me very worrying.
I feel that I am getting a hint at just how much power our elites not only have but how much more they have in reserve, they are clearly prepared to use whatever it takes for their own interests to be upheld which are of course diametrically opposed to its masters.. us !

cliff resnick

5th September 2019 at 2:43 pm

Given the insanity we are now in, say the government possibly tabling a motion of no-confidence in itself and voting for it whilst the opposition would vote against it. This would it seems be not really about Brexit but who has control, the political class or the electorate. Actual Brexit has now become a side show, this battle of wills is about power.

Jerry Owen

5th September 2019 at 3:49 pm

Cliff
I couldn’t agree more.

Lewl Lewly

5th September 2019 at 9:30 am

You chuds must be even stupider than you appear if you don’t realise that Corbyn is playing the Tories like a fiddle. He gets to watch them destroy and completly discredit themselves and then have a cakewalk into number 10 🦀🦀🦀🦀🦀🦀🦀🦀

Michael Lynch

5th September 2019 at 4:22 pm

Think you’ve got that the wrong way around my friend. You can’t vote a deal down three times and then claim you want a deal. You certainly can’t agitate for an election for three years and then refuse one. Zero credibility.

Andy Yule

5th September 2019 at 5:33 pm

Spot on

Jerry Owen

5th September 2019 at 9:52 pm

‘ must be more stupid ‘ is better grammar. Not that it improves the content of your empty post !

A Game

5th September 2019 at 12:42 am

The gross dependency, from the lead up to the referendum and every day since, and particularly these last two days of parliament, and especially from that rotten segment of the Tory party that has been removed for the same reasons you slice away the gangrene from a pustular wound – so that it may heal – from the Remainer Bloc is their fear, concern, anxiety, terror, horror of going over the cliff edge, over the precipice, into the crash, into the apololypse, that they are the truly virtuous because they CARE…
It popped into my head why this grates, even as a choice of propaganda, why it just doesn’t add up.
All Quiet on the Western Front, Paul has realised (and I’m paraphrasing) that bravery isn’t not feeling fear; its feeling fear but still being able to go over the parapet.

And that is the guts of why these people, with their ridiculous hack amateur theatrics of what a passionate politician looks like, what a caring politician acts like, (and enter the biggest ham of the them all – Jess Phillips – her campaign strategy for an electorate she thought she’d have another three years before having to face?) rings so hideously false. Because it doesn’t make psychological sense.

And as is the fashion today, that everything is double speak, they have been trying to market their cowardice as a virtue.

Amazingly fabulous to hear Labour MPs cry a river over Soamsey and Co getting the boot. Fine, upstanding MPs, loyal (more double speak. They’ve come a cropper because in their party’s darkest hour (yep), when they were truly, profoundly tested in their commitment to the Tory cause having lived off the fatted calf for decades, they couldn’t do it. They failed to have loyalty when it mattered the most, and when it might truly cost them something – give up their dream of the European Empire. And they couldn’t even pretend for more than 8 hours that they were persisting in their defiance for love of country. They let their malevolence show. Its about Boris. And they haven’t hesitated to sink the knife in deep to save their Tory skins. The grandson actually stood there talking about when he joined the Cons 40 years ago, it was a humane, compassionate something something party. Right. Just before Maggie ripped the working classes a new one.) robust gentleman of the house… Will they ever live that down?
Madam Lib-Dems. Value for money there. You MUST get a deal, you owe the country a deal, no good deal is possible whatsoever, but you MUST get a deal, a good deal…. realises foot is in mouth… Hilarious.

The staggeringly obvious collusion taking place between the Remainers and the EU. They are feeding each other their lines beautifully.

And as for Corbyn trotting out the default lefty rhetoric… the poor, the disenfranchised… its so tired and stale and hollow… Brexit has certainly lifted the lid on that once and for all. Love the EU? Then you love austerity and trickle down economics.

And of course the Tories are going to loosen the purse strings. They need people with money in their pocket to get consumption up and get those Labour votes. This is the beauty of democracy. It forces politicians to give the people what they need even when they hate doing it. Look at John Howard, as dry as a bone, economically, he became famous for his family welfare policies to keep his “battlers” on side.

JPM Culligan

7th September 2019 at 1:41 pm

tl:dr

Fraser Bailey

4th September 2019 at 11:16 pm

I realised 20 years ago that our political class was almost entirely evil. I suspect that millions of others are now catching up with me.

Bella Donna

5th September 2019 at 9:02 am

I stupidly used to think our Establishment was the finest in the world. Boy has that thought been blown out of the water. Now I want them hanged around Parliament Green upside down!

Michael Lynch

5th September 2019 at 7:28 pm

Don’t worry they’re doing just that themselves. The dramatic rise of the BP was caused by the last delay, just imagine the level of anger now.

Glenn Ogden

4th September 2019 at 10:48 pm

As someone who would have voted to Remain in 2016 if I’d been able to (I live overseas), I am beyond done with the refusal of Parliament and Remain saturated MPs to respect the multiple votes that backed Leave. Not leaving now does more damage to the basic principle of respecting the majority verdict in a democracy than any damage “crashing out” does to the economy or the throttling of the supply of Jaffa Cakes into Britain. Why would anyone vote again in either a referendum or general election if you can’t rely on the outcome being implemented? Also, given how the UK has been treated with contempt in the alleged negotiations which followed the vote, if given the chance I would change my non-existent vote to Leave with bells on.

H McLean

4th September 2019 at 10:32 pm

If the Tories are to stop their terminal slide into oblivion they must remove all the remainer MPs from their party, and make a very public show of it too. This is no longer about left or right, it’s about standing for the sovereignty of your country or surrendering to globalist tyranny. When you simply cannot trust that your MP will stick with the policies and principles they campaigned on then the party itself becomes redundant and worthless. Whether an snap election actually happens or not, defining his party as truly standing for Britain will be the legacy of Boris Johnson, and might possibly save it from itself.

Chris Hanley

4th September 2019 at 10:30 pm

The solution (borrowing from Bertolt Brecht): ‘would it not be simpler for parliament to dissolve the people and elect another?’.

JPM Culligan

7th September 2019 at 3:06 pm

What do you believe freedom of movement is supposed to achieve?

Michael Lynch

4th September 2019 at 8:44 pm

Boris has certainly rattled the cage. I knew they’d expose themselves, but even I can’t believe the amount of Remainers now clambering over each to let us know just how anti the people they are. What makes them think that delaying an election will somehow big them up in the eyes of the British people. The BP came out of nowhere to a stunning victory in the MEP elections precisely because they delayed and made May go cap in hand for an extension. The more they delay the better. I only hope Farage has good security because the Bourgeois could be capable of anything!

Jim Lawrie

4th September 2019 at 11:18 pm

I think they need time to figure out which seats, under a pact, each Party will contest. This is further complicated by the possibility of The Conservatives and Brexit Party doing the same, and estimating how many working class Labour voters will vote Brexit.
Hopefully they will have Diane Abbott on the calculator.

SNP will be trying to guess where the anti-Sturgeon and the Scottish leave vote will go.

Michael Lynch

5th September 2019 at 7:41 pm

Hi Jim. Actually, I’d rather them target the likes of Thornberry and Cooper and leave Dianne alone. Abbot’s ridiculousness is self regulating in a way and it renders her totally harmless. Even if Labour won and Corbyn gave her a cabinet position the responsibility would very quickly overwhelm her. She’d really would be publicly humiliated then. No, it’s the other insufferable snobs who are the truly dangerous figures that need to be targeted. It’s damnable that Thornberry is in a safe seat though.

Francis Lee

4th September 2019 at 8:21 pm

Remainers seem ‘moderate and rational’ – more like screaming banshees howling for blood.

Francis Lee

4th September 2019 at 8:18 pm

In case of any confusion the comment was directed the resident economics expert who seems to be so-clued in that I wonder that he is not shorting the pound. If you’re so smart why aren’t you rich.

Jerry Owen

4th September 2019 at 7:49 pm

Have any of the remoaners here told us how they would feel if the won the referendum in 2016 and us leavers stamped our feet and cried enough and managed to reverse the decision so the minority were the winners how they would take it ?
Would they just shrug their shoulders and accept it.. I doubt it.

Jane 70

4th September 2019 at 6:22 pm

The EU has done a pretty good job in destroying Greece’: its people forced into penury, mass unemployment, cuts to salaries and pensions, young people leaving in droves,a wholly unrealistic demand that it must now run a budget surplus of 3.5% until 2022, with a surplus of 2% thereafter.
Not only this economic punishment, imposed at the behest of Germany, but also the added burden of a mass influx of refugees and economic migrants, encouraged by Merkel’s irresponsible decision to open the borders without seeking the informed consent of fellow member states.
Added to Greece’s purgatory, Italy is struggling, France has the Gilets Jaunes and the Visegrad nations are in open conflict with the movers and shakers in Brussels.
The eurozone is in trouble.
What’s to like?

Jane 70

4th September 2019 at 6:22 pm

Meant as reply to Zenobia Palmyra

James Knight

4th September 2019 at 5:52 pm

Recall how after the referendum Corbyn did a volte face on immigration. Just like his switching sides to Remain during the referendum this switch is a symptom of his unprincipled spinelessness. If he believed in open immigration from the EU he could still stand on that platform after Brexit. The only reason he changed his tune is because he knew that once outside the EU he would have to stand up and argue for that. Inside the EU he can engage in moral posturing about immigration because he knows it cannot be changed and he cannot be held accountable for it.

It is all moral posture and empty of moral principle.

Jim Lawrie

4th September 2019 at 5:51 pm

If The Secretary of State for Northern Ireland announces a Border Poll, Corbyn would have to pass an Act to cancel it, thus torpedoing The Good Friday Agreement. Or The Judiciary would have to stop it. The sight of Sinn Fein appealing to The British courts against such a referendum would finish them. Like their fellow travellers at Westminster, they only want a vote they can win.

If The North votes for a border, the backstop disappears. If they vote to leave, The Brexit majority increases and The South inherit the problem, unless they refuse to accept The North.

Nicola Sturgeon’s machinative Indyref2 now depends on Corbyn et al. being confident that it will be “NO” to independence, because once again, they will not risk increasing the Brexit majority with the loss of The Scottish Remain vote, and they know they have no chance of a Westminster majority without the SNP.

In any vote they see only the snarling, baying plebes.

ZENOBIA PALMYRA

4th September 2019 at 5:44 pm

I’m trying to understand why Leavers continue to blame the EU for the appalling regional divisions that exist in this country. The mass alienation of voters in areas such as Essex, County Durham, Cornwall, South Wales etc. is due fundamentally to the hugely overcentralised nature of British economy and society. Local government has been deliberately destroyed in the UK (a process begun by that wrecker Thatcher). The absence of proper regional government and powerful urban authorities in places such as Birmingham and Hull, along with the absence of modern transport infrastructure and a long-term industrial policy, has prevented their regeneration. The UK is the most centralised state in western Europe, and if you doubt me, look up the stats relating to local tax raising/varying powers in the UK relative to the rest of Europe and the US. The reason for this mass alienation of voters is the dominance of London and the thieving activities of modern capitalist conglomerates who refuse to pay their workers properly and deny central government proper tax revenues (eg Amazon). Blame London, not the EU, for the terrible state of this country.

Dominic Straiton

4th September 2019 at 5:55 pm

Hopefully you will be voting for the Brexit party so an actual small state , conservative party can let the regions ,parish get on with letting us get on with our lives free from dictat.

Jim Lawrie

4th September 2019 at 6:45 pm

Can you evidence your assertion that Leavers blame The EU for regional variations?

Jerry Owen

4th September 2019 at 7:40 pm

Jim Lawrie
You are joking aren’t you !!

Jim Lawrie

4th September 2019 at 10:54 pm

No Jerry, I wasn’t. But I can see that I should have been

Jerry Owen

5th September 2019 at 7:32 am

Z Palmyra
…’ I’m trying to understand ‘ ..
Best not eh.. bless !

Dominic Straiton

4th September 2019 at 5:40 pm

Remoan are simply federalists. They have no interest in the economics of “hard brexit” “soft brexit”cliff edge” “catastrophic brexit” and all the rest. They want Britain to be a region of the Franco German super state. Its that simple. They have no interest in the British parliament having spent the last 40 years undermining it.Everything will be fine. People trade. Government just get in the way.( i do all over the world). Its really easy.

ZENOBIA PALMYRA

4th September 2019 at 5:35 pm

I’m a Remainer and I’m most definitely not ‘scared’ of a general election. In fact, I’ve never met a Remainer who is scared of a general election. I am, however, contemptuous of the pathetic attempts of certain hardcore Leavers to demonise half of the UK electorate. No deal was never part of the original leave campaign and people like Farage and Hannan explicitly rejected talk of no deal or our leaving the single market etc. Like many right thinking, informed, moderate people I would be fine with the UK in a Norway-like relationship with the EU but rightly oppose the economic collapse that would almost certainly follow a hard Brexit.

Neil McCaughan

4th September 2019 at 6:35 pm

You aren’t half the British electorate. Remoaners are small group of crackpots wedded to the idea of German imperial rule.

Just like another small bunch of crackpots in the 1930s.

Michael Lynch

4th September 2019 at 10:27 pm

Spot on.

Bob Loblaw

6th September 2019 at 9:13 am

Leave only just won with 51.9%. Yet remainers are a “small group” of crackpots. What planet do you live on? (Maybe the Sun, or the planet Daily Mail?). There were millions that turned out to the last people’s vote march in London, too. I also find your 1930s comparison hilarious, given the initial aim of the EU contrasted with open racism from Brexiteers

Michael Lynch

7th September 2019 at 12:29 pm

Reply to Bob.

You misunderstand the context and are giving a naive analogy. Left wing parties all over Europe in the thirties were falling over themselves in adulation of Hitler. They emboldened his meteoric rise in Germany. Students in German Universities burnt Jewish books on his behalf. Even a fellow countryman of mine, Bernard-Shaw, the great Socialist, idolized him. Silly old fool. It doesn’t matter how Liberal and progressive Brussels appears to be on the surface because there is no such thing as Benign Dictatorship. History is riddled with examples of such folly. Liberal, progressive societies can only ever exist with full consensus. The minute you rob your population of the right to vote then you begin the slippery descent into Totalitarianism. Socialism without consent is a breeding ground for dictatorship – it’s happening right now in Venezuela.

Jerry Owen

7th September 2019 at 12:34 pm

B Loblaw
At least you agree that leave won.. and you by default lost so accept it.
As for millions marching in London .. utter garbage it was around 200 300 thousand max.
It is a logistic impossibility for millions to enter London on one day.
Anyway it’s the 17.4 million that count they were the winners.

Neil McCaughan

7th September 2019 at 2:48 pm

Loblaw
What planet are you on? You don’t even seem to comprehend plain English.
Remoaners constitute only an unrepresentative minority of those who voted remain. Most remain voters accept that they lost. Remoaners are the new swivel-eyes – obsessive weirdos, for ever whining about how they wuz robbed. Freaks like Adonis, Grayling, Madelina Kay.

But there, your fixation with German imperial rule leaves you incapable of dealing with reality, and the fact we don’t need your permission to determine the future of our country. And I repeat – you are the fascists – arrogant, traitorous, unpatriotic quislings.

Jim Lawrie

4th September 2019 at 5:13 pm

They are turning Parliament into a cocoon.

How long before the BBC “voluntarily, in the interest of the nation” switches off the cameras?

Ian B

4th September 2019 at 4:39 pm

Even if anti no-deal legislation passes surely an incoming government could simply repeal it? Corbyn’s just playing for time.

Jim Lawrie

4th September 2019 at 5:07 pm

All a new Government need do is pack The Lords with new Brexit Peers, pass an Act taking us out of The EU, then abolish The Lords.

Winston Stanley

4th September 2019 at 4:35 pm

The “mother of all” parliaments is certainly starting to take on connotations like “the mother of all” shams and shambles.

One is left wondering what the Remoaners think that the point “of it all” is, government, society, life and everything. Like worms wriggling together in a muddy hole, all pretty pointless really.

Parliament has become the great disillusionment. LOL

Have a GE for gods sake.

ZENOBIA PALMYRA

4th September 2019 at 5:48 pm

As I’ve said before, I have yet to meet any Remainers who are afraid of a general election. Do you think that everything in our society and government should be controlled by popular plebiscite? I prefer representative democracy, which helps to mitigate and channel the passions of the unruly mob. We have parliamentary democracy in this country, not mob rule.

Neil McCaughan

4th September 2019 at 6:38 pm

No one cares what you prefer. It’s not your decision. It was the British People’s decision, and we made it. We don’t need to account to you, or your fellow quislings, for our choice.
Brexit. Now.

Jerry Owen

4th September 2019 at 7:43 pm

Where do you get your cliche’s from ?
It’s just that they are … So tedious .

Ven Oods

8th September 2019 at 1:44 pm

“We have parliamentary democracy in this country, not mob rule.”

That’s true. Unfortunately, a goodly number of MPs are no longer under the banner for which they campaigned. I wouldn’t mind their principles, if only those extended to subjecting themselves immediately to the judgement of their constituents, instead of continuing to bank their salaries.

Siân Webster

4th September 2019 at 4:18 pm

Good piece Brendan. I thought Labour and the LDs were desperate for a ‘people’s vote’ or election… Only on their own terms it would seem.

ZENOBIA PALMYRA

4th September 2019 at 5:37 pm

If hard Brexit destroys our economy and further impoverishes leave-voting areas (although many such areas eg the Tory shires are actually quite wealthy) then Leavers will surely be hoist by their own petard. Unfortunately, the rest of us will be made to suffer for their economic illiteracy.

Francis Lee

4th September 2019 at 5:50 pm

Oh, really, one is a paragon of economic literacy is one. Try this on for size:

Okay so Brexit is to be abjured because it will upset things. Hmmm, like the UK’s smooth running of the structural deficit on current account which has been running since 1989. A deficit of this sort usually means that the currency in question is overvalued. Interest rates in this situation ought to rise, but that is outside of the neo-liberal orthodoxy where only low, no, or negative interest rates are now all the rage. Secondly the oh so super efficient EU is experiencing slow growth, no growth or negative growth. In Germany of all places. 85% of German Bonds are now in negative territory; and there is of course Deutsche Bank which decides to fire 18000 of its workers, no need to worry though. Italian banks are now insolvent. Quarterly growth in the EU area is a breathtaking 0.2% with zero interest or even negative interest rates now common. Unemployment in the EU is 7.5%. France has a debt-to-GDP ratio of 98%, Italy 132% the UK 87% and Germany 61%. It is generally thought that a debt-to-GDP ratio of more than 60% is pushing your luck, remembering that this was the figure for the Maastricht criterion. The southern periphery is using an overvalued currency – the Euro – given it cost and productivity structures compared with the core states, and as a consequence slips deeper into debt, and as for eastern europe, it has not managed to get one state which is more prosperous the Portugal which is the poorest state in western union.

One would have any rational assessment of the EU would conclude that this is not exactly what was planned or expected. And here you have these remainers and the ‘expert’ advisers downgrading the UK based upon a complete lack of insight into what the EU is and how did it get into its present impasse.

The EU – particularly the euro – has been, is, and will continue on present policies to slump into a secular stagnation.

Britain staying in the EU, yep rats jumping onto a sinking ship

Jerry Owen

5th September 2019 at 8:14 am

Z Palmyra
The EU has been fantastic for our fisheries hasn’t it ?

SNJ Morgan

8th September 2019 at 3:42 am

LD’s have made it clear they wouldn’t accept a second Leave vote anyway.

That’s real chutzpah for you – insist on a ‘people’s vote’ (the first referendum was for some other species obviously), and then state you won’t accept the result if it doesn’t go your way!!!

H D Marshall

4th September 2019 at 3:40 pm

I look forward to the absolute decimation of Labour when we eventually get a GE.

Bronk’s Funeral

4th September 2019 at 2:52 pm

Doesn’t sound at all rattled to the point of hooting histrionics, this piece. Nope.

You’d make a great pulp novelist, Brendan.

James Knight

4th September 2019 at 5:40 pm

You would have thought he would jump at the chance, like a terrier with a bone. A shambolic and humiliating Brexit negotiation by the Tories, no longer even a majority. If this is not the time for the opposition to strike, when is it?

To be fair, even if there was an election and Johnson won, Corbyn would not recognise the result in any case. He would expect a coalition government after losing with at least a place in the cabinet. “Compromise” in order to “heal the wounds of division” from the election he just lost. That is how this clown thinks democracy is meant to work.

ZENOBIA PALMYRA

4th September 2019 at 5:45 pm

I agree. The tone is almost hysterical. In my experience, most Remainers seem quite moderate and rational, unlike the ultra-nationalist Leaver ideologues who, for some reason, have decided that they must tank our economy just to prove some perverse point and spite the rest of us.

Neil McCaughan

4th September 2019 at 6:40 pm

Remainers moderate and rational?

How long have you been in that sensory deprivation tank?

Jane 70

4th September 2019 at 7:09 pm

Like the mad bloke who bellows ‘Stop Brexit’ ad nauseam at Westminster?
Or all the weepies?
Or Gina Miller, who felt sick when the referendum result was announced?
Or Screaming Lord Adonis?
Or Mad Al Campbell?
Or the memorably offensive Bob Geldorf?

Francis Lee

4th September 2019 at 8:13 pm

You’ve already said this and it doesn’t sound any more cogent and any less ill-informed than the first time around

Bob Loblaw

6th September 2019 at 9:22 am

It’s not to prove a point. It’s clearly so that the Tories and brexit party (blessed be their name) can lead us back into a golden age of empire once more where the UK is relevant on an international scale. Also we can take back control of the borders because London is far too full of people that aren’t British or working class enough for our liking. Oh yes, and removal of the evil EU illuminati overlords will mean that our great and wise government can give all that EU money to the poor and the NHS. We know this because they’re the epitome of trustworthiness and they clearly keep their promises. This is the gospel and all who disagree are clearly traitors to the country, and probably not proper Brits, not to mention, dare I say it, Unpatriotic.